Contents

Syrians use the term 'Special Forces' to describe the 14th, 15th divisions, as well as the independent 'special forces' regiments, but they more closely resemble conventional light infantry units, than WesternSpecial Forces in both mission and composition.

The term Special Forces has been applied ostensibly because of their specialized training in airborne and air assault
operations, but they should be regarded as light infantry forces and elite only in relation to the conventional armored and mechanized brigades of the Syrian Army.[3]

Holliday wrote in 2013 that "the 15th Special Forces Division is a relatively recent formation, established between the mid-1990s restructuring of Ali Haidar’s former Special Forces Command" and the beginning of the Syrian Civil War.[4]

Since it was founded, the division comprises four regiments under the leadership of Major General, Jihad Jaber, the commander of First Corps, and its leader, former Major General, Fuad Hamoudeh Brigadier General Esber Abboud, Brigadier General Ahmed Younis al Oukda commander of the 404th Tank Regiment, and Dean, Ahmed el Kousa 405 artillery commander of the regiment, and Brigadier Hassan Aizora commander of the regiment 44 special forces.

Consistent reporting in mid-February 2012 showed that all three regiments of the 15th Special Forces Division had left their bases near the Jordanian border to join the fight in Homs.

The Syrian Government committed at least one Special Forces regiment to Idlib in 2011 and strongly reinforced the region with three additional Special Forces regiments, an armored brigade, and a detachment of 4th Armored Division troops by the spring of 2012. The 76th Armored Brigade and 41st Special Forces Regiment arrived in Idilb by late February 2012, establishing positions in the north and south of Idlib Governorate respectively. Two of the Special Forces regiments that participated in the February 2012 siege of Homs also moved to Idilb, namely, the 15th Division’s 35th Special Forces Regiment, which moved to Jisr al-Shughour, where it secured the key line of communication to coastal Latakia, and the 14th Division’s 556th Special Forces Regiment, which occupied positions south of Maarrat al-Nu'man. Elements of the 4th Armored Division also moved to northern Syria after the siege of Homs, but it is unclear how long those elite forces remained. Most of the Division’s reported activity in the north took place that spring, and it is difficult to see whether activity or reporting tapered off.

In mid-March 2012, troops from the 4th Armored Division, 76th Armored Brigade, and 35th Special Forces Regiment quickly cleared rebels out of Idlib city, but pushed rebels into the surrounding countryside in the process. The operation represented a relatively modest force commitment. Imagery released by the U.S. State Department showed between thirty and thirty-five armored vehicles encircling Idilb in the operation, which represents far less than one brigade’s worth of vehicles according to Syrian Army doctrine.[3]

Joseph Holliday, "The Assad Regime: From Counterinsurgency to Civil War", Institute for the Study of War, March 2013. Seemingly the best concise description and analysis of the Syrian Army and its involvement in the current Syrian Civil War.

1.
Syria
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Syrias capital and largest city is Damascus. Religious groups include Sunnis, Christians, Alawites, Druze, Mandeans, Shiites, Salafis, Sunni Arabs make up the largest religious group in Syria. Its capital Damascus and largest city Aleppo are among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, in the Islamic era, Damascus was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate and a provincial capital of the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt. The post-independence period was tumultuous, and a number of military coups. In 1958, Syria entered a union with Egypt called the United Arab Republic. Syria was under Emergency Law from 1963 to 2011, effectively suspending most constitutional protections for citizens, Bashar al-Assad has been president since 2000 and was preceded by his father Hafez al-Assad, who was in office from 1970 to 2000. Mainstream modern academic opinion strongly favours the argument that the Greek word is related to the cognate Ἀσσυρία, Assyria, in the past, others believed that it was derived from Siryon, the name that the Sidonians gave to Mount Hermon. However, the discovery of the inscription in 2000 seems to support the theory that the term Syria derives from Assyria. The area designated by the word has changed over time, since approximately 10,000 BC, Syria was one of centers of Neolithic culture where agriculture and cattle breeding appeared for the first time in the world. The following Neolithic period is represented by houses of Mureybet culture. At the time of the pre-pottery Neolithic, people used vessels made of stone, gyps, finds of obsidian tools from Anatolia are evidences of early trade relations. Cities of Hamoukar and Emar played an important role during the late Neolithic, archaeologists have demonstrated that civilization in Syria was one of the most ancient on earth, perhaps preceded by only those of Mesopotamia. The earliest recorded indigenous civilisation in the region was the Kingdom of Ebla near present-day Idlib, gifts from Pharaohs, found during excavations, confirm Eblas contact with Egypt. One of the earliest written texts from Syria is an agreement between Vizier Ibrium of Ebla and an ambiguous kingdom called Abarsal c.2300 BC. The Northwest Semitic language of the Amorites is the earliest attested of the Canaanite languages, Mari reemerged during this period, and saw renewed prosperity until conquered by Hammurabi of Babylon. Ugarit also arose during this time, circa 1800 BC, close to modern Latakia, Ugaritic was a Semitic language loosely related to the Canaanite languages, and developed the Ugaritic alphabet. The Ugarites kingdom survived until its destruction at the hands of the marauding Indo-European Sea Peoples in the 12th century BC, Yamhad was described in the tablets of Mari as the mightiest state in the near east and as having more vassals than Hammurabi of Babylon. Yamhad imposed its authority over Alalakh, Qatna, the Hurrians states, the army of Yamhad campaigned as far away as Dēr on the border of Elam

2.
Syrian Army
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The Syrian Army, officially the Syrian Arab Army, is the land force branch of the Syrian Armed Forces. The Syrian Army originated in military forces formed by the French after World War I. It officially came into being in 1945, before Syria obtained full independence the following year, since 1946, it has played a major role in Syrias governance, mounting five military coups, and in 1954,1963,1966, and 1970. It has fought four wars with Israel and one with Jordan, an armored division was also deployed to Saudi Arabia in 1990–91 during the Persian Gulf War, but saw little action. From 1976 to 2005 it was the pillar of the Syrian occupation of Lebanon. In 1919, the French formed the Troupes spéciales du Levant as part of the Army of the Levant in the French Mandate for Syria, the former with 8,000 men later grew into both the Syrian and Lebanese armies. This force was used primarily as auxiliaries in support of French troops, as Syria gained independence in 1946, its leaders envisioned a division-sized army. The 1st Brigade was ready by the time of the Syrian war against Israel on May 15,1948 and it consisted of two infantry battalions and one armored battalion. The 2nd Brigade was organized during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War and also included two battalions and one armored battalion. At the time of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the army was small, poorly armed, paris had relied primarily on French regulars to keep the peace in Syria and had neglected indigenous forces. Consequently, training was lackadaisical, discipline lax, and staff work almost unheard of, there were about 12,000 men in the Syrian army. These troops were grouped into three infantry brigades and an armored force of about battalion size writes Pollack. Between 1948 and 1967, a series of military coups destroyed the stability of the government, in March 1949, the chief of staff, General Husni al-Zaim, installed himself as president. Two more military dictators followed by December 1949, General Adib Shishakli then held power until deposed in the 1954 Syrian coup detat. Further coups followed, each attended by a purge of the corps to remove supporters of the losers from the force. Discipline in the army broke down across the board as units and their commanders pledged their allegiance to different groups and parties. Indeed, by the late 1950s, the situation had become so bad that Syrian officers regularly disobeyed the orders of superiors who belonged to different ethnic or political groups writes Pollack. The 1963 Syrian coup détat had as one of its key objectives the seizure of the Al-Kiswah military camp, there was another 1966 Syrian coup detat

3.
Division (military)
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A division is a large military unit or formation, usually consisting of between 10,000 and 20,000 soldiers. Infantry divisions during the World Wars ranged between 10,000 and 30,000 in nominal strength, in most armies, a division is composed of several regiments or brigades, in turn, several divisions typically make up a corps. In the West, the first general to think of organising an army into smaller units was Maurice de Saxe, Marshal General of France. He died at the age of 54, without having implemented his idea, victor-François de Broglie put the ideas into practice. He conducted successful practical experiments of the system in the Seven Years War. The first war in which the system was used systematically was the French Revolutionary War. It made the more flexible and easy to manoeuvre. Under Napoleon, the divisions were grouped together into corps, because of their increasing size, napoleons military success spread the divisional and corps system all over Europe, by the end of the Napoleonic Wars, all armies in Europe had adopted it. In modern times, most military forces have standardized their divisional structures, the peak use of the division as the primary combat unit occurred during World War II, when the belligerents deployed over a thousand divisions. With technological advances since then, the power of each division has increased. Divisions are often formed to organize units of a particular type together with support units to allow independent operations. In more recent times, divisions have mainly been organized as combined arms units with subordinate units representing various combat arms, in this case, the division often retains the name of a more specialized division, and may still be tasked with a primary role suited to that specialization. For the most part, large cavalry units did not remain after World War II, in general, two new types of cavalry were developed, air cavalry or airmobile, relying on helicopter mobility, and armored cavalry, based on an autonomous armored formation. The former was pioneered by the 11th Air Assault Division, formed on 1 February 1963 at Fort Benning, on 29 June 1965 the division was renamed as the 1st Cavalry Division, before its departure for the Vietnam War. After the end of the Vietnam War, the 1st Cavalry Division was reorganised and re-equipped with tanks, the development of the tank during World War I prompted some nations to experiment with forming them into division-size units. Many did this the way as they did cavalry divisions, by merely replacing cavalry with AFVs. This proved unwieldy in combat, as the units had many tanks, instead, a more balanced approach was taken by adjusting the number of tank, infantry, artillery, and support units. A panzer division was a division of the Wehrmacht and the Waffen-SS of Germany during World War II

4.
Light infantry
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Light infantry are soldiers whose job was to provide a skirmishing screen ahead of the main body of infantry, harassing and delaying the enemy advance. Light infantry was distinct from medium, heavy or line infantry, heavy infantry were dedicated primarily to fighting in tight formations that were the core of large battles. Heavy infantry originally had heavier arms and more armour than light infantry, as with so called light infantry of later periods, the term more adequately describes the role of such infantry rather than the actual weight of their equipment. Peltast equipment, for example, grew steadily heavier at the time as hoplite equipment grew lighter. It was the fact that peltasts fought in order as skirmishers that made them light infantry. Early regular armies of the era frequently relied on irregulars to perform the duties of light infantry skirmishers. In the 18th and 19th centuries most infantry regiments or battalions had a company as an integral part of its composition. Its members were often smaller, more men with high shooting ability and capability of using initiative. They did not usually fight in disciplined ranks as did the infantry but often in widely dispersed groups. They were expected to avoid melee engagements unless necessary, and would fight ahead of the line to harass the enemy before falling back to the main position. Light infantry sometimes carried lighter muskets than ordinary infantrymen while others carried rifles and these became designated as rifle regiments in Britain and Jäger regiments in German speaking Europe. In France, during the Napoleonic Wars, light infantry were called voltigeurs and chasseurs, the Austrian army had Grenzer regiments from the middle of the 18th century, who originally served as irregular militia skirmishers recruited from mountainous frontier areas. Light infantry officers sometimes carried muskets or rifles, rather than pistols, orders were sent by bugle or whistle instead of drum. Some armies, including the British and French, recruited whole regiments of light infantry, by the late 19th century the concept of fighting in formation was on the wane due to advancements in weaponry and the distinctions between light and heavy infantry began to disappear. Essentially, all infantry became light infantry in operational practice, some regiments retained the name and customs, but there was in effect little difference between them and other infantry regiments. On the eve of World War I the British Army included seven light infantry regiments, today the term light denotes, in the United States table of organization and equipment, units lacking heavy weapons and armor or with a reduced vehicle footprint. At its height, this included the 6th Infantry Division, 7th Infantry Division, 10th Mountain Division, 25th Infantry Division, operation Just Cause is often cited as proof of concept. Almost 30,000 U. S. Forces, mostly light, during the 1990s, the concept of purely light forces in the US military came under scrutiny due to their decreased lethality and survivability

5.
Syrian Civil War
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The Syrian Civil War is an armed conflict taking place in Syria. Syrian opposition groups formed the Free Syrian Army and seized control of the area surrounding Aleppo, over time, some factions of the Syrian opposition split from their original moderate position to pursue an Islamist vision for Syria, joining groups such as al-Nusra Front and ISIL. In 2015, the Yekîneyên Parastina Gel joined forces with Arab, Assyrian, Armenian, Russia and Hezbollah militarily engaged in support of the Syrian government, while beginning in 2014, a coalition of NATO countries began launching airstrikes against ISIL. International organizations have accused the Syrian government, ISIL, and some groups of severe human rights violations. The conflict has caused a major refugee crisis, over the course of the war a number of peace initiatives have been launched, including the March 2017 Geneva peace talks on Syria led by the United Nations, but fighting continues. Syria became an independent republic in 1946, although democratic rule ended with a coup in March 1949, a popular uprising against military rule in 1954 saw the army transfer power to civilians. From 1958 to 1961, a union with Egypt replaced Syrias parliamentary system with a highly centralized presidential government. The secular Baath Syrian Regional Branch government came to power through a successful coup détat in 1963, for the next several years Syria went through additional coups and changes in leadership. In March 1971, Hafez al-Assad, an Alawite, declared himself President, on 31 January 1973, Hafez al-Assad implemented a new constitution, which led to a national crisis. They labeled Assad the enemy of Allah and called for a jihad against his rule, the government survived a series of armed revolts by Sunni Islamists, mainly members of the Muslim Brotherhood, from 1976 until 1982. Upon Hafez al-Assads death in 2000, his son Bashar al-Assad was elected as President of Syria, Bashar al-Assad and his wife Asma, a Sunni Muslim born and educated in Britain, initially inspired hopes for democratic reforms. The Damascus Spring, a period of social and political debate, the Damascus Spring largely ended in August 2001 with the arrest and imprisonment of ten leading activists who had called for democratic elections and a campaign of civil disobedience. In the opinion of his critics, Bashar al-Assad had failed to deliver on promised reforms, Syrian Arabs, together with some 600,000 Palestinian Arabs, make up roughly 74 percent of the population. Syria Muslims are 74 percent Sunnis, and 13 percent Shias,3 percent were Druze, not all of the Sunnis are Arabs. Bashar is married to a Sunni, with whom he has several children and he is affiliated with the sect that his parents belong to, the minority Alawite sect which comprises an estimated 8-12 percent of the total population. Assyrians, an indigenous Eastern Aramaic-speaking Christian Semitic people, numbering approximately 500,000, are mainly in northeast Syria. A larger population lives over the border in northern Iraq, other ethnic groups include Armenians, Circassians, Turkmens, Greeks, Mhallami, Kawliya, Yezidi, Shabaks, and Mandeans. Socioeconomic inequality increased significantly after free market policies were initiated by Hafez al-Assad in his later years, the country also faced particularly high youth unemployment rates

6.
Western world
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The Western world or the West is a term usually referring to different nations, depending on the context, most often including at least part of Europe. There are many accepted definitions about what they all have in common, the Western world is also known as the Occident. The concept of the Western part of the earth has its roots in Greco-Roman civilization in Europe, before the Cold War era, the traditional Western viewpoint identified Western Civilization with the Western Christian countries and culture. Its political usage was changed by the antagonism during the Cold War in the mid-to-late 20th Century. The term originally had a literal geographic meaning, Western culture was influenced by many older great civilizations of the ancient Near East, such as Phoenicia, Minoan Crete, Sumer, Babylonia, and also Ancient Egypt. It originated in the Mediterranean basin and its vicinity, Greece, over time, their associated empires grew first to the east and west to include the rest of Mediterranean and Black Sea coastal areas, conquering and absorbing. Later, they expanded to the north of the Mediterranean Sea to include Western, Central, numerous times, this expansion was accompanied by Christian missionaries, who attempted to proselytize Christianity. There is debate among some as to whether Latin America is in a category of its own, specifically, Western culture may imply, a Biblical Christian cultural influence in spiritual thinking, customs and either ethic or moral traditions, around the Post-Classical Era and after. European cultural influences concerning artistic, musical, folkloric, ethic and oral traditions, the concept of Western culture is generally linked to the classical definition of the Western world. In this definition, Western culture is the set of literary, scientific, political, artistic, much of this set of traditions and knowledge is collected in the Western canon. The term has come to apply to countries whose history is marked by European immigration or settlement, such as the Americas, and Oceania. The geopolitical divisions in Europe that created a concept of East and West originated in the Roman Empire, Roman Catholic Western and Central Europe, as such, maintained a distinct identity particularly as it began to redevelop during the Renaissance. Even following the Protestant Reformation, Protestant Europe continued to see itself as more tied to Roman Catholic Europe than other parts of the civilized world. Use of the term West as a cultural and geopolitical term developed over the course of the Age of Exploration as Europe spread its culture to other parts of the world. Additionally, closer contacts between the West and Asia and other parts of the world in recent times have continued to cloud the use, herodotus considered the Persian Wars of the early 5th century BC a conflict of Europa versus Asia. The terms West and East were not used by any Greek author to describe that conflict, the Great Schism and the Fourth Crusade confirmed this deviation. The Renaissance in the West emerged partly from currents within the Roman Empire, Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew from a city-state founded on the Italian Peninsula about the 9th century BC to a massive empire straddling the Mediterranean Sea. In its 12-century existence, Roman civilization shifted from a monarchy, to a republic, nonetheless, despite its great legacy, a number of factors led to the eventual decline of the Roman Empire

7.
Special forces
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Special forces and special operations forces are military or police units trained to conduct special operations. The term special forces in the United States refers to the U. S. Armys forces, in Russian-speaking countries special forces are typically called spetsnaz, an acronym for special purpose. Likewise, Russian speakers refer to special forces of nations as spetsnaz, for example. Special Forces would be referred to as amerikanski spetsnaz in Russian, other significant roles lay in reconnaissance, providing essential intelligence from near or among the enemy and increasingly in combating irregular forces, their infrastructure and activities. Hamilcar Barca in Sicily had specialized troops trained to launch several offensives per day, in the late Roman or early Byzantine period, Roman fleets used small, fast, camouflaged ships crewed by selected men for scouting and commando missions. In Japan, ninjas were used for reconnaissance, espionage and as assassins, bodyguards or fortress guards, during the Napoleonic wars, rifle and sapper units were formed that held specialised roles in reconnaissance and skirmishing and were not committed to the formal battle lines. The British Indian Army deployed two special forces during their wars, the Corps of Guides formed in 1846 and the Gurkha Scouts. During the Second Boer War the British Army felt the need for specialised units became most apparent. This unit was formed in 1900 by Lord Lovat and early on reported to an American, Major Frederick Russell Burnham, after the war, Lovats Scouts went on to formally become the British Armys first sniper unit. Additionally, the Bushveldt Carbineers, formed in 1901, can be seen as an unconventional warfare unit. Modern special forces emerged during the Second World War, in 1940, the British Commandos were formed following Winston Churchills call for specially trained troops of the hunter class, who can develop a reign of terror down the enemy coast. A staff officer, Lieutenant Colonel Dudley Clarke, had already submitted such a proposal to General Sir John Dill, Dill, aware of Churchills intentions, approved Clarkes proposal and on 23 June 1940, the first Commando raid took place. The Special Service Brigade was quickly expanded to 12 units which became known as Commandos, each Commando had a lieutenant colonel as the commanding officer and numbered around 450 men. In December 1940 a Middle East Commando depot was formed with the responsibility of training and supplying reinforcements for the Commando units in that theatre, in February 1942 the Commando training depot at Achnacarry in the Scottish Highlands was established by Brigadier Charles Haydon. Under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Charles Vaughan, the Commando depot was responsible for training complete units, the training regime was for the time innovative and physically demanding, and far in advance of normal British Army training. The depot staff were all hand picked, with the ability to any of the volunteers. Training and assessment started immediately on arrival, with the volunteers having to complete an 8-mile march with all their equipment from the Spean Bridge railway station to the commando depot, exercises were conducted using live ammunition and explosives to make training as realistic as possible. Physical fitness was a prerequisite, with cross country runs and boxing matches to improve fitness, speed and endurance marches were conducted up and down the nearby mountain ranges and over assault courses that included a zip-line over Loch Arkaig, all while carrying arms and full equipment

8.
Airborne forces
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Airborne forces are military units, usually light infantry, set up to be moved by aircraft and dropped into battle, typically by parachute. Thus, they can be placed behind enemy lines, and have the capability to deploy almost anywhere with little warning. The formations are limited only by the number and size of their aircraft, so given enough capacity a huge force can appear out of nowhere in minutes, Major Lewis H. Brereton and his superior Brigadier General Billy Mitchell suggested dropping elements of the U. S. 1st Division behind German lines near Metz, the operation was planned for February 1919 but the war ended before such an attack could be seriously planned. Mitchell conceived that US troops could be trained to utilize parachutes. Following the war, the United States Army Air Service experimented with the concept of having carried on the wings of aircraft pulled off by the opening of their parachutes. The first true paratroop drop was by Italy in November 1927, within a few years several battalions had been raised and were eventually formed into two Folgore and Nembo divisions. Although these would fight with distinction in World War II. Men drawn from the Italian parachute forces were dropped in a special operation in North Africa in 1943 in an attempt to destroy parked aircraft of the United States Army Air Forces. Subsequently, on May 10,1928, Second Lieutenant César Álvarez War Palmas Las voluntarily jumped from a height of 3,000 meters, then on May 16,1928, Major Fernando Melgar Conde and Sergeant 1st. Jose Pineda Castro, jumped from the famous Las Palmas at altitudes of 2,000 and 4,300 meters, at about the same time, the Soviet Union was also experimenting with the idea, planning to drop entire units complete with vehicles and light tanks. To help train enough experienced jumpers, parachute clubs were organized with the aim of transferring into the armed forces if needed, one of the observing parties, Germany, was particularly interested. In 1936, Major F. W. Immans was ordered to set up a school at Stendal. The military had purchased large numbers of Junkers Ju 52 aircraft which were slightly modified for use as paratroop transports in addition to their other duties. The first training class was known as Ausbildungskommando Immans and they commenced the first course on May 3,1936. Other nations, including Argentina, Peru, Japan, France, France became the first nation to organize women in an airborne unit. Recruiting 200 nurses who during peacetime would parachute into natural disasters, several groups within the German armed forces attempted to raise their own paratroop formations, resulting in confusion. As a result, Luftwaffe General Kurt Student was put in command of developing a paratrooper force to be known as the Fallschirmjäger

9.
Air assault
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Invariably the assaulting troops are highly dependent on aerial fire support provided by the armed helicopters or fixed-wing aircraft escorting the VTOL. Air assault should not be confused with air attack, air strike, or air raid, Air assault and air mobility are related concepts. However, air assault is distinctly a combat insertion rather than transportation to an area in the vicinity of combat, Air assault operations are not merely movements of soldiers, weapons, and materiel by Army aviation units and must not be construed as such. Air assault units can vary in organization, using not only in transport but also as close air fire support, medical evacuation helicopters. Airmobile artillery is often assigned to air assault deployments, units vary in size, but are typically company- or brigade-sized units. Airmobile units are designed and trained for air insertion and vertical envelopment, air resupply, one specific type of air assault unit is the US Army air cavalry. It differs from regular air assault units only in fulfilling a traditional cavalry reconnaissance, similarly, the US 101st Airborne Division was originally classed as airborne, then airmobile and now air assault. Air mobility has been a key concept in offensive operations since the 1930s, initial approaches to air mobility focused on airborne and glider-borne troops. During World War II many assaults were done by military gliders, the World War Two era German Fallschirmjäger and Brandenburgers glider borne paras laid the foundation for modern day Air Assault operations. In 1941 the U. S. Army quickly adopted this concept of offensive operations initially utilizing wooden gliders before the development of helicopters, following the war faster aircraft led to the abandonment of the flimsy wooden gliders with the then new helicopters taking their place. Another example being the German Brandenburgers glider borne operation at Ypenburg during World War Two, in 1946, U. S. Marine General Roy S. During this time, The Commandant of the Marine Corps, Alexander Vandegrift and this board recommended that the USMC develop transport helicopters in order to allow a diffused attack on enemy shores. It also recommended that the USMC form an experimental helicopter squadron. HMX-1 was commissioned in 1947 with Sikorsky HO3S-1s, in 1948 the Marine Corps Schools came out with Amphibious Operations—Employment of Helicopters, or Phib-31, which was the first manual for helicopter airmobile operations. The Marines used the vertical envelopment instead of air mobility or air assault. HMX-1 performed its first vertical envelopment from the deck of a carrier in an exercise in 1949. American forces later used helicopters for support and transport to great effect during the Korean War showing that the helicopter could be a versatile, the first helicopter airlift and helicopter sling load mission was conducted on September 13,1951 during the Korean War. Operation Windmill I was conducted by the United States Marine Corps in support of a clearing the enemy from a series of ridges around an extinct volcano called The Punchbowl. In total seven HRS-1 Marine helicopters made 28 flights that delivered 8,550 kg of supplies and evacuated 74 seriously wounded men

10.
Jordan
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Jordan, officially The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is an Arab kingdom in Western Asia, on the East Bank of the Jordan River. Jordan is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the east and south, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north, Israel, Palestine and the Dead Sea to the west, Jordan is strategically located at the crossroads of Asia, Africa and Europe. The capital, Amman, is Jordans most populous city as well as the countrys economic, what is now Jordan has been inhabited by humans since the Paleolithic period. Three stable kingdoms emerged there at the end of the Bronze Age, Ammon, Moab, later rulers include the Nabataean Kingdom, the Roman Empire, and the Ottoman Empire. After the Great Arab Revolt against the Ottomans in 1916 during World War I, the Emirate of Transjordan was established in 1921 by the then Emir Abdullah I and became a British protectorate. In 1946, Jordan became an independent state known as The Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan. Jordan captured the West Bank, which it later lost in 1967, during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, Jordan is a founding member of the Arab League and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, and is one of two Arab states to have signed a peace treaty with Israel. The country is a monarchy, but the king holds wide executive and legislative powers. Jordan is a relatively-small, semi-arid, almost-landlocked country with a population numbering at 9.5 million, Sunni Islam, practiced by around 92% of the population, is the dominant religion in Jordan. It coexists with an indigenous Christian minority, Jordan is considered to be among the safest of Arab countries in the Middle East, and has avoided long-term terrorism and instability. The kingdom is also a refuge to thousands of Iraqi Christians fleeing the Islamic State, while Jordan continues to accept refugees, the recent large influx from Syria placed substantial strain on national resources and infrastructure. Jordan is classified as a country of high human development with a middle income economy. The Jordanian economy, one of the smallest economies in the region, is attractive to foreign investors based upon a skilled workforce, the country is a major tourist destination, and also attracts medical tourism due to its well developed health sector. Nonetheless, a lack of resources, large flow of refugees. Jordan is named after the Jordan River, where Jesus is said to have been baptized, the origin of the rivers name is debated, but the most common explanation is that it derives from the word yarad, found in Hebrew, Aramaic, and other Semitic languages. Others regard the name as having an Indo-Aryan origin, combining the words yor and don, another theory is that it is from the Arabic root word wrd, as in people coming to a major source of water. The name Jordan appears in an ancient Egyptian papyrus called Papyrus Anastasi I, the lands of modern-day Jordan were historically called Transjordan, meaning beyond the Jordan River. The name was Arabized into Al-Urdunn during the Muslim conquest of the Levant, during crusader rule, it was called Oultrejordain

11.
Homs
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Homs, previously known as Emesa, is a city in western Syria and the capital of the Homs Governorate. It is 501 metres above sea level and is located 162 kilometres north of Damascus, located on the Orontes River, Homs is also the central link between the interior cities and the Mediterranean coast. Its population reflects Syrias general religious diversity, composed of Sunni and Alawite, there are a number of historic mosques and churches in the city, and it is close to the Krak des Chevaliers castle, a world heritage site. Homs did not emerge into the record until the 1st century BCE at the time of the Seleucids. It later became the capital of a kingdom ruled by the Emesani dynasty who gave the city its name, originally a center of worship for the sun god El-Gabal, it later gained importance in Christianity under the Byzantines. Homs was conquered by the Muslims in the 7th century and made capital of a district that bore its current name, throughout the Islamic era, Muslim dynasties contending for control of Syria sought after Homs due to the citys strategic position in the area. Homs began to decline under the Ottomans and only in the 19th century did the city regain its importance when its cotton industry boomed. During French Mandate rule, the city became a center of insurrection and, after independence in 1946, in the ongoing Syrian civil war, Homs became an opposition stronghold and the Syrian government launched a military assault against the city in May 2011. The following Siege of Homs left much of the city completely destroyed, the war in the city ended in 2015 when rebels evacuated the city, resulting in a government victory. The origin of the modern name is that it is an Arabic form of the citys Latin name Emesus. The name Emesa seems to derive from the nomadic Arab tribe, called Emesenoi by the Greeks and the Romans, Emesa was shortened to Homs or Hims by its Arab inhabitants, many of whom settled there prior to the Muslim conquest of Syria. This name has been preserved throughout the period of Islamic rule continuing to the present day and it was known as la Chamelle by the Crusaders, although they never ruled the city. For approximately 2,000 years, Homs has served as a key market, production site. It has also provided security services to the hinterland of Syria, excavations at the Citadel of Homs indicate that the earliest settlement at the site dates back to around 2300 BCE. Biblical scholars have identified the city with Zobah mentioned in the Bible, in 1274 BCE, a battle took place between the forces of the Egyptian Empire under Ramesses II and the Hittite Empire under Muwatalli II at the city of Kadesh on the Orontes River near Homs. It was possibly the largest chariot battle ever fought, involving perhaps 5, at this time, Greek philosopher Strabo spoke of a tent-dwelling tribe called the Emesani living in the area around the Orontes and south of the Apamea region. They were an Arab tribe in the area and settled in Emesa—which derived its name from them. Their chief at the time, Sampsiceramus I, gained the status as King of Emesa, but their capital was at Arethusa, a city north of Emesa, also along the Orontes River

12.
Latakia
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Latakia, Lattakia or Latakiyah, is the principal port city of Syria, as well as the capital of the Latakia Governorate. Historically, it has also known as Lāŏdĭcḗa or Lāŏdĭcḗa ad Mắre. In addition to serving as a port, the city is a center for surrounding agricultural towns. According to the 2004 official census, the population of the city is 383,786 and it is the 5th-largest city in Syria after Aleppo, Damascus, Homs and Hama, and it borders Tartus to the south, Hama to the east, and Idlib to the north. Cape Apostolos Andreas, the tip of Cyprus, is about 68 miles away. Although the site has been inhabited since the 2nd millennium BCE, Latakia was subsequently ruled by the Romans, then the Ummayads and Abbasids in the 8th–10th centuries CE. Under their rule, the Byzantines frequently attacked the city, periodically recapturing it before losing it again to the Arabs, afterward, Latakia was ruled successively by the Seljuk Turks, Crusaders, Ayyubids, Mamluks, and the Ottomans. Following World War I, Latakia was assigned to the French mandate of Syria and this autonomous territory became the Alawite State in 1922, proclaiming its independence a number of times until reintegrating into Syria in 1944. Like many Seleucid cities, Latakia was named after a member of the ruling dynasty, first named Laodikeia on the Coast by Seleucus I Nicator in honor of his mother, Laodice. In Latin, its name became Lāŏdĭcḗa ad Mắre, the original name survives in its Arabic form as al-Ladhiqiyyah, from which the French Lattaquié and English Latakia or Lattakia derive. To the Ottomans, it was known as Turkish, Lazkiye, the location of Latakia, the Ras Ziyarah promontory, has a long history of occupation. The Phoenician city of Ramitha was located here, known to the Greeks as Leukê Aktê. The city was described in Strabos Geographica, It is a city most beautifully built, has a good harbour, and has territory which, besides its other good crops, abounds in wine. Now this city furnishes the most of the wine to the Alexandreians, and while the summits are at a considerable distance from Lāŏdĭcḗa, sloping up gently and gradually from it, they tower above Apameia, extending up to a perpendicular height. The city was an important colonia of the Roman empire in ancient Syria for seven centuries and it was called Laodicea in Syria or Lāŏdĭcḗa ad mắre and was the capital of the Eastern Roman province of Theodorias from 528 AD until 637 AD. A sizable Jewish population lived in Lāŏdĭcḗa during the first century, the heretic Apollinarius was bishop of Lāŏdĭcḗa in the 4th century. The city minted coins from an early date, following the defeat of Antiochene forces at the Battle of Harran in 1104 the city was reoccupied by the Byzantines however they would again lose the city. Despite a treaty in 1108 with Bohemond promising to return Latakia to the Empire by 1110 it was firmly under the control of the Principality of Antioch